As a long time UMPC (Ultra Mobile PC) user, having a single device that could function as a mobile companion and a desktop computer has been a long time dream. For years I used Sony’s excellent UX180 UMPC to facilitate this sort of usage, but cramming a full desktop OS into a handheld package was not a solution that could work for the mainstream. Trying to scale from big to small proved to be difficult for battery life and control schemes. In the end the UMPC never reached out of the niche category. The dream, however, has lived on.

Could Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich be the OS that not only bridges the gap between smartphone and tablet, but also extends to the desktop?

It seems that scaling from small to large may be a better approach for the computer-as-a-desktop paradigm, as is evident from this video demonstrating such usage with a Galaxy Nexus hooked up to a large monitor, wireless keyboard and trackpad:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_–zcmqIyRI

If the demonstration above isn’t a compelling look at where the future of mobile computing could lead, I don’t know what is!

Seeing this really reawakens that dream of having a single device that can scale gracefully across multiple use-cases. Chippy calls this sort of multiple-scenario functionality ‘High Dynamic Range Computing‘ (HDRC); among other challenges, he warns that the industry may resist supporting HDRC because they want us to continue to purchase multiple devices instead of just one.

The author of the video makes a great point — this is already a pretty good experience, but it’s rarely even touted as a feature of the platform (maybe that’s some of the resistance coming into play).

We’ve seen similar multi-scenario computing with Android devices before. The Motorola Atrix has an optional ‘lapdock’ which gives the user a large screen and full keyboard, and even a full build of Linux Firefox to use. Alternatively, the Atrix could be hooked up to a dock with HDMI output for use with a full monitor. Though less broad in scope, Asus is leading the way with the ‘smartbooks’ form-factor by offering detachable keyboards to their line of Transformer tablets.

If Google started to push this sort of usage, they could give all Android users HDRC functionality which would provide a productive environment when the device is hooked up to the right peripherals. It seems like all of the core functionality is already built into Android. Google could get an important upper-hand on Apple with this strategy as Apple would likely shy away from this sort of power-user feature.

What’s your take on HDRC with Android devices? Is this something you’d like to see further developed, or would you rather keep your productivity and your smartphone consumption separate?

I’ve been following a disturbing trend over the last few years as the Android platform (and now WP7 as well) matures. Smartphone screen sizes just keep growing and growing, and they don’t seem to want to stop. I have a number of issues with smartphones that have overly-large screens. It pains me to see that, while Android is known for giving users many choices, it’s nearly impossible to get a reasonably-sized flagship phone. For me, for a smartphone to be a ‘smartphone’ at all, and not a tablet, it has to be easily usable with one hand. Of course then the definition of smartphone/tablet will change from person to person, because our hands are not all the same size, however, there is certainly a finite limit for everyone where a phone will become too big to be comfortably used with one hand.

I’m currently testing the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. So far it’s been a rather wonderful phone, and I recently wrote this on Google Plus:

I’ve been using the iPhone for 3 generations. Right now I’m testing a Galaxy Nexus. If they made the same exact phone in a size that’s actually comfortable for one-hand use, I might call myself an Android convert. Curse you 4″+ screens and the awful fad that you are!

For me, the 4.65″ screen on the Galaxy Nexus is just too big. I constantly have to shuffle the phone around in my hand because Android places the two most frequently used aspects of the interface (the menu buttons and the notification drawer) at opposite ends of the phone. The size of the phone and the required shuffling means that I’ve got a poor grip on it, and I’ve been rather worried about dropping it during use. Again, those with larger hands will not have the same issue at 4.65″, but at some point they will run into the same problem.

Android Handset Screen Size Over Time

To show the trends of Android smartphone screen sizes over time, I compiled screen size and release date data from 155 smartphones from five major manufacturers (Motorola, Samsung, HTC, Sony, LG). I’d like to thank PDADB.net for their comprehensive release date info. (click to enlarge graphs)

As you can see, since the introduction of the 3.2″ HTC Dream / G1, screen sizes have consistently increased. Today we’re seeing 4″, 4.5″, 4.7″, 5″, and even 5.3″ smartphones! A simple projection (seen on the main chart) suggests that before 2013 is out, many handsets will have 5″ screens, while the flagship phones of that time may have even larger screens (if this trend continues) of 5.5″ or perhaps 6″.

With a slope of 0.0016, LG is increasing its Android smartphone screen sizes the most rapidly of these five manufactures. Despite pioneering some of the largest phones on the market at certain points in the timeline, Motorola is actually showing the slowest rate of increase in Android smartphone screen size with a slope of 0.0009, but of course this isn’t very far off from the leader!

Why is This Happening?

A good question to ask is what’s prompting the growth in screen size. It seems natural for manufacturers to have experimented with screen sizes as the platform grew legs. Different screen sizes are a point of differentiation for an Android phone manufacturer — a way to stand out in a sea of similar options. Bigger screens were also an easy way for companies to try to beat out the iPhone on features, even if the ‘bigger is better’ argument doesn’t hold much water in this case. Now it seems to have turned into a snowball effect whereby manufacturers are trying to one-up each other to have the biggest screen in town (all the while, Apple has stuck with 3.5″ since the introduction of their handsets). You wouldn’t believe how many times I’ve heard the phrase “biggest and baddest” when marketers are referring to a new Android phone. They use this phrase as though bigger is always better, but I must say — when it comes to comfortable one-handed smartphone use — it is not.

Where Does It Stop?

My question is this: where do we draw the line? As I mentioned, despite variations in hand sizes, everyone reaches a limit of comfortable one-hand usability at some point. I don’t have the raw data to back it up, but I believe that Android smartphone screen sizes are rapidly surpassing the maximum size for comfortable one-handed use by the average Android customer. None of this is to say there aren’t advantages to having a larger screen (particularly when it comes to media viewing), but given that people much more frequently use their smartphones for apps rather than media viewing, the argument for surpassing a users one-handed comfort zone to provide a better media experience is a poor one.

It’s not so much that screen-sizes are increasing (the chart clearly shows that other sizes are still available), but the bothersome fact is that it’s near-impossible to get a flagship phone unless you’re willing to buy one of the massive phones on the market. If you want a phone that comes in a size that’s comfortable for one-handed use, you have to be willing to settle as a second-class Android citizen — the only options available to you will likely have slower processors, less RAM (and may be based on an older platform) than the newest and biggest flagship phone currently on the market.

Chrome for Android has just been launched.

Many of you know I run three sites. Carrypad, the tablet-focused site. Ultrabooknews, the thin-and-light laptop site and this one, UMPCPortal.  At UMPCPortal we’ve been focused on productive mobility since 2006 (almost exactly) and as you will probably know, the last few years have been hard on us. Trying to get productivity into a two-handed mobile experience has been completely ignored by mainstream manufacturers. We’ve all tried tablets of course and all been disappointed at the lack or processing power, lightweight apps and of course, the full web experience which requires a full web browser. Mozilla tried with Firefox for Android but didn’t really get there yet. Most people settled on Dolphin HD as the best of the bunch but it wasn’t anywhere near the experience needed for web-based productivity and creation.

Intel offered us some hope with Meego, an optimised Linux-based OS that included a Chromium browser…

MeeGo offers me some hope. A full internet experience and an app store but it’s something needs to mature until at least late 2011 and in fact for it to function fast enough to be productive it will need a high-end dual-core ARM or Intel Moorestown platform that will not be able to provide all-day battery life in a smartphone form-factor. [ref June 2010]

… but we all know what happened there.

And then along came the best smartbook yet. The Asus Transformer Prime has fantastic looking hardware, 18hr battery life (with leyboard dock) and some great sensor, touch and app experiences. The problem was that it also had issues when addressing productive and creative work. The apps are still thin and the browser still terrible.

But there was nothing else to choose from. Until today that is.

Chrome for Android has been launched. It’s in the Android Market for anyone with an Android Ice Cream Sandwich device and it’s fully functional. Well, it seems to be. This Beta software may have a few bugs but it represents the best step yet towards a productive handheld ‘UMPC’ solution. There will still be problems with low-quality, unstable and badly supported native apps,  but Chrome on Android is going to develop fast, encourage a new market for Android tablets and  enable a whole new world of desktop-quality browsing.

There are early issues. Mouseover doesn’t seem to be working well and there could be performance issues related to the (relative to laptops) lack of CPU, memory and general platform speed but these are likely to be fixed very quickly given the effort Google is putting into its browser.

Unfortunately for me, I don’t have an ICS tablet right now. I will be looking for ‘ROM’ upgrade for the Acer A500 I have here as it supports USB host (for keyboards/mice etc) and would work well as a smart, Chrome-based desktop device but that could take a few days before I get round to it. Maybe I’ll be looking for an ASUS Transformer Prime though. Given its smartbook credentials and Chrome for Android it now has the potential to span Carrypad, UMPCPortal and Ultrabooknews!

• The official Google Chrome for Android announcement is here.
• Kevin Tofel, a seasoned ultra-mobile man, is reporting for GigaOm here.
• Engadget have a hands-on video too.

A quick note on the Android 4.0 requirement. I think it’s a brave bu neccesary move. It means that only ‘Google Android’ gets the best browser and encoruages a big shift to ICS over 2012. it might be annoying for some now but it makes absolute sense to encourage a move away from 2.x and 3.x variants and get everyone moving with ICS. When that happens, ISVs will be far more likely to invest in high-quality tablet application development and that’s where the turning point comes. Following the turning point, the niche designs will jump in too. There’s every chance that we’ll start to see UMPCs again…running Android. I know you’ll be concerned with security, apps, interfaces and such but I feel sure we’ll see those issues solved. The market for alternative designs is going to grow quickly so watch out for a fresh batch of ultra mobile PC news!  It also makes Apple think hard again about a smartbook although my guess is that they have been working on one for a long time already.

Don’t forget that this app is very likely to be in development for X86 devices too. Intel will be putting massive effort into getting this optimised for Medfield-based devices. Comparing Sunspider tests, hopefuly at MWC later this month, will be fun!

I’m interested to hear your thoughts below. I’m sure we’ll have a good discussion.

Updates:

Noted – There’s no Flash support. I’m not sure too many are going to have a problem with this and it sends an important message out to web developers – Stay clear of Flash!

There seems to be a problem with agent-id. I’m reading that Chrome for Android is identifying itself as a mobile browser.

No matter how fast your tablet or smartphone is, without proper web-standards support, you may run into roadblocks while trying to do various online tasks. It’s hard to pin down one single instance where lack of standards support is going to hurt you, but for me what it really comes down to is confidence in one’s browser. By this I mean: when I leave the house and have only my smartphone with me, I might need to do something through the browser that I’ve never done before (and thus don’t know whether or not it will work correctly); I should have confidence that my phone will be able to handle it.

I’ll give you one example: several years ago I was standing in a long line to buy lift tickets at a ski resort. Only after we’d been standing in line did we come to know that you could get a discount if you pre-purchased the tickets online. Smartphone-in-hand, we went to the resort’s website and pre-purchased lift tickets for the group while waiting in line. Had my smartphone not had sufficient browser standards support, it’s very likely that I wouldn’t have been able to properly interact with the resort’s website — whether it be a drop down list, radio button, or form-entry mechanics, which just might not have worked quite right, preventing me from completing the task at hand. Having the confidence that you’ll be able to do nearly anything through the browser of your smartphone/tablet that you could do from your desktop is an important factor in anyone who is serious about mobile productivity. And while my example above obviously wasn’t a very big deal; imagine yourself in a business situation where some vital task needs to be accomplished in a pinch, and you’ve got only your smartphone with you. Screw it up and miss the deadline and you’ve lost the big account — only because you weren’t able to do what you thought you could through your mobile browser.

HTML5 represents the latest version of standardized web language. A browser that fully supports HTML5 and a website written properly with HTML5 means that there should be perfect parity between the functionality of the website and the ability of the browser to interpret that website — and allow you to do pretty much anything from your smartphone/tablet that you could do from your desktop browser. With this in mind, you may be interested, as I am, in seeing which mobile browsers have the best HTML5 support to date. Be sure to note that HTML5 is still under development, so ‘full compatibility’ is a moving goal post at this point, and scores are being improved with every browser/OS update. Before you look at the results, why don’t you guess which platform/browser will have the best HTML5 support. Go on, guess!

HTML5 Test Mobile Browser Scores

I mostly kept the most modern version of each operating system’s browser on the chart, except I kept Android 2.2/2.3 and 3.0/3.1/3.2 because the vast majority of Android smartphones are still running 2.2/2.3 while most Android tablets are running 3.0/3.1/3.2.

Unlike what I would have expected, even as of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, the default Android browser is not leading the pack of HTML5 compatible browsers. Actually, currently in the lead is the second version of RIM’s tablet OS which scores an impressive 329. Of course, this is still in development and even when it’s released, it won’t be running on all that many devices (burn! sorry, RIM). In that case, the real winner at the moment is actually Firefox Mobile 9, which sort of puts Android in the lead by a loophole (their platform allows such apps to exist!). Firefox Mobile 9 scores 313 which is doubly good because it can run on any Android device with 2.0 or beyond. After Firefox Mobile 9 is Safari on iOS 5 which trails not far behind with a score of 305.

So what does one take away from this? Well, if you’re on Android (even if you’re using the very latest version), it might be in your best interest to have a copy of Firefox installed for those times when you absolutely need a website to work. It’s fortunate for Android that Firefox is stepping up the game with HTML5 compatibility as the current most popular Android installs have relatively weak compatibility, and even the very latest build isn’t in the top 5.

And Then There’s Internet Explorer…

Oh, Internet Explorer. What a reputation you’ve earned for yourself. I’m so glad the world is no longer oppressed by your reign of terror; now we’ve got excellent alternatives like Chrome, Firefox, and others. It seems like Microsoft is doomed to have an inferior browser — even their new mobile offering, Windows Mobile 7, can’t escape the curse.

Though I still cringe when I see the IE icon on the Windows Phone 7 start screen, the browser actually works pretty well. It’s unobtrusive and quite responsive. When it comes to compatibility however, it doesn’t impress. When I first tested Windows Mobile 7, Internet Explorer scored a paltry 17 on the HTML5 test! The most modern mobile incarnation of Internet Explorer, found with WP 7.5 (Mango), still finds itself at the very bottom of the charts, scoring only 141 points.

The saddest part about this is that Windows Phone needs browser compatibility more than any of the others. Why? Because the platform is having a hard time attracting triple-A app developers. For users, this means that they may need to fall back to web-apps to make use of their favorite services. Without good compatibility support in the browser, web-apps aren’t guaranteed to work, even if they were designed to be multi-platform. The whole point of HTML5 as a standardized language is that being able to build one website that is fully functional, regardless of which device or browser is being used, is advantageous to both web developers and users. Because WP7 is one of the less adopted mobile platforms currently on the market, it’s unlikely that web developers are going to have custom-made web-apps created to function with the proprietary nature of IE on WP7. Instead, they’re going to make a web-standards compatible site that can work across multiple devices (especially considering that the most widespread platforms [Android and iOS] are among those with the best browser compatibility).

When I tested an Intel Menlow-based MID in July 2008 and saw the PC architecture streaming music into a browser-player running at 2.8W I knew Intel were on the right track. Two years later with their next-gen architecture, Moorestown, they tackled the standby power drain and managed to get it into a phone. I had exclusive hands-on and although the device was hot and eventually deemed uncompetitive, it was clear to see where this was heading. This week at CES I put my hand on the back of an Intel Medfield-based smartphone and felt nothing. No heat! On the front, I saw a quick user experience and when I tested Sunspider I saw an impressive result of 1290ms, with Android 2.x.

Over at AnandTech, meanwhile, Anand has been discussing more details about the performance and energy consumption figures.  Not only are we seeing good performance but Intel are telling us that the efficiency is in the leading class too.  The most impressive figure on the article? 1W browsing. That’s with screen-on and 3G-on. 1 WATT! Intel are now able to control a ‘PC’ to the point where everything turns off except the parts required. That doesn’t mean that Intel will be competitive in all areas though. Like Ultrabooks, the platform is likely to have a high ‘dynamic range’ and probably a higher system thermal design characteristic but if the work that Intel have done on Android is solid, that may not be a problem.

What a shame though that Meego wasn’t around to benefit from Medfield. I’m sure there are Meego devices in the Intel labs working just fine and I’m sure that Tizen is likely to re-surface too (My bet Samsung + Intel + Tizen make an announcement at MWC) but it would have been nice to see Intel’s Meego work result in a product. I wonder how Nokia are feeling at this point? With the N9 having been a success and the figures on Medfield/Android looking good, Intel may get sweet revenge!

What Intel need now are product partners and platform advantages. Being competitive isn’t going to be enough to make the best product in the market so this is where 1080p hardware encoding, hardware-based image processing, Wireless-Display, McAfee and other technologies come into play. Intel Insider (for securely streaming first-run movies) and integrated radios, hardware encryption and of course, Intel’s silicon process advantage. if you consider how far Intel have come in the last 4 years, look at their technology portfolio and think about what’s going to happen in the next two years there should be no doubt that Intel will be playing, and possibly leading in the years to come.

I won’t discount Cortex A15 and similar ARM architectures and we must not forget that ARMv8 is going to be feeding in after a few years but Intel’s position with Medfield now enables it to go and court some of its biggest customers for phones, tablets, set-top boxes and more and that partner ecosystem could be the real advantage for Intel.

I was taken completely  by surprise this morning  when I was told that the Intel Medfield-based tablet running Android ICS at the Intel booth today is in fact the Lenovo Ideatab K2210 due later this year. Wow! Is it finally going to happen?

Read the full story

In a brief Facebook update today Bluestacks, the company that makes an Android app ‘player’ for X86-based PCs, has alluded to an Ultrabook-related announcement at CES.

Update: Bluestacks demonstrated on an Ultrabook at CES.

No more information has been given but it wouldn’t be wrong to consider that they might have had a bit of funding from the Intel Capital Ultrabook fund and that they’re preparing an Ultrabook-optimised Android application player (Hypervisor to give it its correct term) for Ultrabooks. Take the thought one stage further and wouldn’t it be interesting if they teamed up with Intel’s AppUp team to support application payment and download in one place. the idea has legs but may take a while to bring to fruition.

Read the full story

If you have been following any of my musings on gaming (over on my personal blog or via my Twitter feed), you know that the past year has presented me with a challenge in keeping up with the latest and greatest. With little time left for gaming after attending to classwork and my day job, I have found a good deal of solace in the availability of A-Class titles that are now present in the Android Market. At the start of 2011, Android was not, in my opinion, a viable gaming proposition. There were few titles, and the market was plagued with problems due to the variance in hardware that the mobile developers were faced with.

As 2011 approached an end, that tide turned. There are many titles availbale in the market that will keep an avid gamer busy, and enough variation that gamers are not forced to play genres that normally do not interest them just so that they have something to play. Below are some of my thoughts and philosophical perspectives on gaming on Android as one of my primary gaming platforms, as well as a list of my ten current favorite titles.

Just so you have a sense of my gaming background before I run through this list of titles, I have been gaming for 35 years. I started when my father brought home the Magnavox Odyssey, a Pong-system that was the first TV video game system that sold at retail in North America. I “grew up” on Pong, KC Munchkin, Space Harrier, Vectorman, Panzer Dragoon, Soul Caliber, Tekken Tag Tournament, Halo, Project Gotham Racing 3, and Resistance: Fall of Man. In between jaunts on a lot of consoles, I have also done a lot of PC Gaming, including the likes of Falcon 4.0, The Sims, Half-Life 2, Unreal Tournament, Baldur’s Gate 2, Icewind Dale, Homeworld, and Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War. The point being, my tastes run a fair gamut and are not satisfied by a diet of casual games only.

I am sure that some readers will pshaw the thought of gaming on a tablet or other mobile device. They might vehemently declare that any gaming on these platforms is significantly beneath any gaming that you could do on a console or PC. And I might even partially agree with them. I, too, used to believe that gaming in a mobile OS was only worthwhile if you were stuck standing in line somewhere. This strong support of mobile OS gaming that I am now feeling is based on its convenience. My life is compressed for time, as I am sure everyone’s is.

Gaming on a tablet means that I can game during a study break in my home office and not take the time to go downstairs to the media room or the basement home theatre to fire up the PS3, or bring up a PC. Even if one of those systems were in my home office where I study, there are too few titles that I can get into and out of in 30 minutes without being worried about being sucked in for more time than I can afford.

Through plumbing some of the depth that there is available in gaming on Android, I have discovered titles that I can play for 5 to 15 minutes and get out of, as well as titles that can offer an hour or two in a single sitting when that time is available. The key for me is that those titles do not have to go for that hour or two if that is time I do not have, because most of the titles that I am playing have short levels or very well designed save points. It actually greatly surprises me that Android games often have better save points than some of the ones that I see in full console retail games.

With that being said, here are my current top ten favorite Android games:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vVDl5LXVeY

Apparatus [$2.45 / Free (Lite)] — As an Engineer, I find immense joy in trying to figure out these mechanical and physics-based puzzles. The first few levels just require an understanding of geometry. From there the game quickly progresses you to a point where you need to intuitively understand inertia, relative motion, and gravity. Nothing in my undergrad Statics class prepared me for some of the challenges presented by this tinkerer’s dream.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0P0B9ThYrlA

Battle Group [$0.99] — I spent my time at sea, and was really surprised to see how well this game’s basic gameplay maps to the tactical paradigms that I was trained to embrace. Defense-in-depth, fields of fire, and other tenets of air defense come to play in this replica of air warfare at sea. The game cradles you a bit by leaving you to not have to worry about maneuvering your Battle Group, but most players will have enough to focus on in trying to defeat the waves of maneuvering aircraft, sea-skimming missiles, and low-slow flyers.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9RnTud0Rhs

Can Knockdown 2 [$0.99] — This is a pretty simplistic physics-based game and definitely falls into the casual category. Still, there is a golf-like elation akin to hitting a great drive when you tag a can popped up from a pipe on its way back down. There are a few different challenge modes, including stationary cans, pop-up cans that are analogous to shooting skeet, and a timed-mode. I cannot say that you will get a ton of time out of this one. Once you set your initial all-time records, it is unlikely that you will make significant threshold changes in score, but it is still fun trying to eke out that one or two extra points over your old high-score.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7eSq8YRZdU

Fieldrunners HD [$2.99] — You can check out my mini-review over on my personal blog. Simply put, this is one of my two favorite Android Tower Defense games (the second is also in this list).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TVZkfqHNBc

Great Little War Game [$2.99] — When I downloaded this, I thought that it would be a challenge that I would quickly surmount. Not so. While not quite as deep as a PC turn-based strategy game, a game of GLWG can take a couple of hours for some of the more challenging maps. There are many maps that have control points that will change hands many times, and mounting a combined arms offensive (or defensive) with the maps’ limited resources is no small feat. Be prepared to be forced to consider how to sacrifice certain resources and units for the greater overall strategic effort in order to grind through this game’s skirmishes.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TntE55pN_Qc

Guerilla Bob THD [$3.99 / Free (Lite)] – if you played bottoms-up scrolling shooters from the past, then this title will tickle your fancy. Big explosions and cheesy one-liners will take you back to the 80s, but with a little more visual flair. The sound on this title is also no slouch. You can check out a vid of the gameplay over on my YouTube channel (the video has audio problems, but at least you can see the game running on a 23″ monitor).

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxjETrX3LOM

MiniSquadron Special [$2.99] – The gameplay in this title is almost so simple that I questioned posting it to my top-ten list. But again, this list is a good bit about titles that are quick to get into, have some determinisitic fun, and get out.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rP7Xn8_vo84

Riptide GP [$2.99] — Like a lot of stunt driving games, part of the joy in this title is that you never really know exactly what stunts you are going to try and pull off, how they are going to look, and how they are going to turn out. I have quickly soured on games that only offer tilt controls without offering a touch-screen control scheme as an option, but for some reason I give Riptide a pass on this element. Truth is, in this title, being forced to tilt adds to the randomness inherent in how a race turns out, and I do not feel that tilting the screen constantly removes my ability to appreciate the game’s visuals, which is typically my problem with tilt-control games.

Robo Defense [$2.99 / Free (Lite)] — I say that this is my second-favorite Android Tower Defense title, and that may not quite be fair. The truth is that the eye-candy and audio in Field Runners is more refined than it is in Robo Defense, and that counts for some points with me. Field Runners is more fun to sit and watch once you have your death-trap maze established. But I will admit hat Robo Defense is deeper, with the equivalent of achievements that you can earn to upgrade the capability of your towers. There are also some deeper branches that you can implement in various towers, such as turning machine-gun towers into Flame-thrower towers or AA-gun Towers.

X Construction [$1.49 / Free (Lite)]  — Another engineer’s joy; you have to figure out how to rig the components that you are given to support a train crossing a given obstacle. Many is the time that I thought I understood how my static construct would react to forces imparted from a mass moving across it to find out…not so much. Even when you screw one of the levels up, though, you are learning something, so the title returns some enjoyment pretty much all of the time. I cannot say the same about every console title I have played in the past year.

So that’s the list of ten. I mentioned a term above, deterministic fun, that is pertinent to my feelings on Android gaming. Regardless of grammatical correctness, this a term I started applying last year to define the gaming experience that I was looking for. What I mean by it is the knowledge that I am definitely going to have fun with a title when I fire it up and commit to playing it for 30 minutes. It also means that I know, or at least strongly feel, that there is a very good chance that I will have progressed somewhat in the game after that 30 minutes of time. The requirement for this characteristic to exist for any given title that I was going to play while classes were in session is what led to me playing a lot more Need for Speed Hot Pursuit than Uncharted or Battlefield Bad Company, for instance, on my consoles. In the latter two, more story-driven titles, there is less of a chance that I am going to definitively have fun and make some measurable progress in a single 30 minute session. I recognize the difference in value-judgements that I am making; this characteristic is not an overall value metric that I place on a title. In other words, I am not saying that quick, episodic gaming experiences are more valuable overall than story-driven, thread oriented or acr-driven, gaming titles, and I hope to get back to games where there is more risk involved for potentially greater reward in terms of time invested. Once school is over.

Right now, if I am going to play something over a 30 minute study-break, I need to be damned sure that that time is going to yield more fun than just frustration. More than anything, that is maybe the reason I have been spending more and more of the limited gaming time that I have available in Android than on my PS3, PSP, or my gaming PCs. The big thing is that gaming for me is a permanent hobby that I never want to leave. But unless I find some means to stay hooked into it on some platform then I am liable to leave it behind and it will be a struggle to get back to it. My main point in this article is that, a year ago, Android would not have been able to provide that outlet. If you have not dipped your toe into Android gaming because you feel it cannot hold your attention as effectively as a console or PC title, I would recommend you give one or two titles another go. Also, keep in mind that these are the titles that offer me the outlet to get in and get out in 30 minutes or less. I have about 35 titles in Android gaming, and some of them, like NOVA 2, Dungeon Defenders, and DGunners SP, go deeper and offer lengthier gaming experiences. There is a lot that Android offers now for gamers, and even if it just for gaming on the go or while on travel, there might be something out there that can hold your attention for a bit.

(Drafted on my Acer Iconia Tab A500 in Beautiful Notes)